The adventure begins!

After nearly two years of talking about and planning our trip to Malta, the trip finally began Friday, March 18, 2016.  Christine had wanted to return to Malta for more than just a brief visit.  During her recovery from her hamstrings injury a couple of years ago, she spent hours searching the internet for a nice place to stay.  Then when the Caruana property in Malta sold and all the many, many heirs received their portion of the proceeds, Christine decided to take the money and spend it on a trip to Malta.  So in November 2014, she paid a down payment on an apartment on the front in Sliema, just down the block from St. Julian’s Bay where she had lived as a child.  We decided to spend three months in Malta, plenty of time to learn about the history and culture of the islands and to walk as much of Malta as we can.  On the way, we wanted to stop in London to visit Eve, and then stop in Barcelona – just because.

Of course, getting ready for a trip 3-1/2 months away from home is no easy undertaking.  We had lots to do to prepare for being gone.  Fortunately, I had the time to do a lot of the prep work because I’m retired, while Christine was very engrossed in her newest customer and getting them started using TQAudit.  She has been working round the clock and didn’t have much time to do much else.  But she managed to get things stabilized with her customer just in the knick of time.  Our friend JoAnn picked us up and drove us to the airport.  Here’s what the luggage looked like for a 3-1/2 month trip.  Yikes!  We were just under the weight limit with our checked bags.  I’m sure we’re taking way too much stuff.

We flew from Binghamton to Detroit.  We arrived at the Detroit airport and walked through our favorite tunnel.

We really like the Detroit airport.  The fountain is fun to watch because of its gymnastics in spitting shoots of water that they are segmented and just hang in air.  We had a pleasant surprise in that near the fountain was a fellow playing piano.  There was a nice little seating area nearby and so we sat for a long time listening to songs from the standard songbook.  It was soothing and helped everyone relax.

Finally, we boarded our flight to London on Virgin Atlantic.  I was taking a picture of the plane and noticed near the nose the name of the plane.  I thought it was a nice name – Lady Love.

But it is certainly true that airlines are making seats smaller and closer together.Virgin Atlantic really packs you in.  We had no legroom at all and the seats were really uncomfortable.  God forbid the person in front of you reclines because that makes the little screen in their seat back practically hit you in the face – too close for you to see the movie you wanted to watch.  But we actually had a nice meal, a free drink, and all was okay.  Except for the turbulence.  It was a bumpy ride across the pond.

We arrived at Heathrow right on time – the busiest hour of the day.  That meant that about 5,000 arriving passengers hit immigration all at once.  It took over an hour to get through.  They had the ziggy zaggy lines set up so that you were kind of constantly moving, like at Disney, but you got nowhere fast.  But we got through immigration and then picked up our luggage.  There was no customs line surprisingly.  If you had something to declare, you picked up a phone and talked with an official.  Otherwise, you went right out the door.

We took the Heathrow Express train from the airport to Paddington Station.  It was easy finding the platform and only a 15 minute ride to Paddington.

We rolled our luggage through the station and found where to get a taxi – outside of platform 12.  You could follow a line on the floor in the station that directed you to the “taxi rank.”  There was no line and we got into one of those cute little black Brit taxis and off we went to find our Airbnb rental.  The apartment is located in the St. John’s Wood area, which is an upscale area.  We were told that we might likely see Sir Paul McCartney walking around.  Wouldn’t that be something!

This is our first Airbnb experience.  We rented a room in an apartment.  Josh is our host, and he is a lovely young man.  He’s a lawyer and also has a band and is a show promoter.  We have a very nice bedroom in his flat.

We couldn’t get into our room yet, so we went out for a walk around the neighborhood, which turned into quite a walk.  We wandered around for about two hours.  It is spring in London and the bulbs and flowering trees are in abundance.  Although it was very cool and quite overcast, we were happy to see all the wonderful colors.

We then walked around until we found Regents Canal in Regent’s Park.  Christine, the water baby, has to find water wherever we go.  So we walked along the canal for a bit.  We came upon moored longboats, or narrow boats.  These are actual residences and they are very interesting.  It is amazing to see all the plants the folks have, both on the boats and along the pathway.

And if you don’t want to live on a boat, but want to see the canal, you could live in one of these.

Here are some other sights around the area.

We went back to the room and had a nap.  Then we went to the St. John’s tube station to buy our Oyster cards, the thing that gets you onto the public transport vehicle, whether bus or tube.  Then we walked over to Eve’s apartment for a drink.  We then went round the corner to a fabulous Lebanese restaurant and stuffed ourselves with several mezzas (small plates of the most delicious food).  Eve then walked us over to the bus stop and we made our way back to Cochrane Close.

Seems like we covered an awful lot of ground, literally, in just 18 hours!